[Aceshigh7]

Well, I won my cruise in the 3rd set of semi's on my first try, so I'm 1/1. I believe luck is a huge factor given the size of the field. All you can do is try to be very sharp and minimize mistakes. There isn't much room to recover from a loss. You pretty much have to have your stack steadily going up the whole way.
I recovered from a tough beat that put me all-in early in the tournament to become the chip leader down most of the home stretch. I was getting AA and KK so many times it was crazy.
One piece of advice I would give you is if you get a big chip stack, stay aggressive. I saw a few people with huge stacks go into defensive mode a bit too early and ended up finishing just out of the money.